Serial #98579 ????

[nylovells]

Hello!
I have an old town canoe, and what I think is the serial number. I had to do a rubbing of the serial # b/c it was difficult to read the number right off the wood. Hope you can help!

P.S, I believe that it is between 16 or 18 feet (just an estimate, didn't have a tape measure). Also, it has open gunnels (i believe that is the correct term). And possibly made of mahogany (but with the age of wood, I had difficulty figuring this out)...

 

[Kathryn Klos]

Hello--

Attached is information on Old Town 98579, and also a picture for you to compare with the boat you own. If what you have looks more like a canoe, I suspect this is the wrong serial number.

Old Town serial numbers appear on both stems and are 5-6 numbers, followed by a space and the length of the canoe-- like "123456 16" for a 16-foot canoe.

Many of the old builders had 5-digit serial numbers, and some appear on the stem just as with Old Town... although often only on one stem. A picture of your canoe can help identify it, if it doesn't match the record posted here.

Old Town 98579 is a 16 foot, AA (top) grade sea model boat with a keel and bilge keels. It was originally painted orange with a black arrow stripe, and shipped to Providence, RI, on January 24, 1929. The scan of this record is attached below-- click on it to get a larger image.

This scan and several hundred thousand others were created with substantial grants from the Wooden Canoe Heritage Association (WCHA) and others. A description of the project to preserve these records is available at http://www.wcha.org/ot_records/ if you want more details. I hope that you and anyone else reading this will join or renew membership in the WCHA so that services like this can continue. See http://www.wcha.org/wcha/ to learn more about the WCHA and http://www.wcha.org/join.php to renew.

The image of the sea model comes from "The Complete Old Town Canoe Company Catalog Collection, 1901- 1993", available on CD from http://www.wcha.org/catalog/ and http://www.dragonflycanoe.com/cdrom.htm on the web.

Kathy

 

[Kathryn Klos]

P.S. Sometimes the length of a canoe can be estimated by the number of thwarts. Knowing this comes in handy when looking at canoes on eBay and craigslist, where sellers often fail to list the canoe's length.

16 foot canoes by most builders have two thwarts, and 17 and 18 foot canoes usually have three... but may be missing a middle thwart, so you have to look for an empty space big enough for another thwart. 15 footers sometimes have only one thwart--- depends on the builder--- and under 15 feet, one thwart is most likely.